Research Guides: Research Data Management: Citing Data

Introduction

UGC - RDM Training Materials

Just like citations to books and articles, data used in research deserve proper credit to ensure research integrity; it also helps others to locate the data source, which facilitate research reproducibility and increase research impact.

Same as citing publications, there are varying formats for data citation as advised by different style guides. Generally, the following components are required:

	Creator(s)	The entity responsible for creating the data
	Title	The title of the dataset
	Date of publication	The data that data published or otherwise released to the public
	Publisher	The entity responsible for hosting the data (e.g. a repository)
	Version	The data version
	Identifier	The unique public identifier that points to the data (e.g. DOI)
	Date Accessed	Date of accessing the dataset for reference

Examples of data citation:

Style	Citation example	Remark	URL
	O’Donohue, W. (2017). Content analysis of undergraduate psychology textbooks (ICPSR 21600; Version V1) [Data set]. ICPSR. https://doi.org/10.3886/ICPSR36966.v1	Follow the reference example as advised in APA style.	https://apastyle.apa.org/style-grammar-guidelines/references/examples/data-set-references
	Author. Title of dataset. Publisher, Publication Date, Location. Publisher name, Date of publication (format DD Month YYYY), location. doi/url of data	The MLA Handbook does not specifically reference datasets. Use the generic format instead.	https://style.mla.org/works-cited/works-cited-a-quick-guide/
	Author. Title of dataset. Publisher, Publication Date, Location. Publisher name, Date of publication (format DD Month YYYY), location. doi/url of data	The Chicago manual does not specifically reference datasets. Use the generic format instead.	https://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/home.html
	Author. Title of dataset. Publisher, Publication Date, Location. Publisher name, Date of publication (format DD Month YYYY), location. doi/url of data	The IEEE Guide to Writing does not specifically reference Datasets. Use the generic format instead.	https://ieeeauthorcenter.ieee.org/wp-content/uploads/IEEE-Reference-Guide.pdf
	4-Bromo-2-fluorotoluene. SDBSWeb. National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology. n.d. https://sdbs.db.aist.go.jp (accessed 2019-03-17). (CAS RN: 51436-99-8).	Follow the reference example as advised in ACS style.	https://pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10.1021/acsguide.40303

Reference Sites:

DataCite - Cite Your Data: https://datacite.org/cite-your-data.html
Digital Curation Centre - How to Cite Datasets and Link to Publications: https://www.dcc.ac.uk/guidance/how-guides/cite-datasets
Ripeta - The Anatomy of a Data Citation: https://ripeta.com/2021/01/29/the-anatomy-of-a-data-citation/

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